Loess Country: Bloom

By Ryan Allen
​(This is part of the Loess Country series--check back for more soon!)

BLOOM
 
is what I think
when I look my little girl in the eyes as I hold her. This little one,
 
the first bud of a compass plant, waking up
in a dew-soaked prairie,
 
a new life in my hands and arms--
at first hanging so purple
 
cocooned between caterpillar
and butterfly,
 
between a breath a cry and a shiver
to shake off the fall leaves
 
circling in wind,
 
now so content
to eat and poop and pee and love.
 
I learn new ways
to kneel and pray.
 
What we plant is what we grow.
 
And the sky
is spinning forever
 
and raining the yellowest leaves
around my little girl’s cry.
 
O! Prairie! O! Wind!
O! Life!,                                         
carry us to that piece of earth
where all our flowers
can bloom.